Hey guys,
I have a 05 wrx 21000 miles with stock wheel\tires. I went to LA and came back for the long weekend and felt vibration on the steering wheel while breaking(only while breaking) @ 70 mph. the pressure on all tires were little high and it vibrates even after that.
I have not done a wheel balacing till now on any of the wheels
To me it looks like its out of balance. could there b any other problem?
can i just go to any tire shop to get it balanced in the santa clara area

TIA

 

Only while braking? I'd assume warped rotors, though it seems weird to me only after 21k miles. Wheel balance vibration issues usually occur during any higher speed driving.

 

Yeah. It kind of sounds like rotors too. How long are rotors suppose to last anyways?

 

I have a similar issue, only it kicks in at higher speed braking (~80). I think it's rotors, because when I'm stopping from slower speeds at stop signs, I can feel slight pulsing in the brake pressure. I haven't addressed the issue yet though, so I have no idea the costs involved...

 

resurface your rotors

 

tnx for the reply guys. i had the thought of rotors too because the vibration happening only while breaking. atleast they will b covered by warranty wont they?

 

At only 21,000 miles they still should be under warranty, although if they've been turned once, you might be done with that set of rotors.

My car was shaking to beat $hit under braking, from just about any speed-

I just had a new set of rotors put on at GST and its totally fixed, my car is a pleasure to drive again.

If its a balance thing, it will shake at a certain speed, usually not faster and not slower- regardless of braking or not.

 

i had this same problem on my pathfinder and the reason was i had to brake real hard once on my way to tahoe as some jery decided to cut me.

After that i got my roters resurfaced and brake pads chaged an all was fine.

 

could be brake dust build-up on your rotors. Find a deserted street, accelerate to about 60mph, then brake suddenly to full stop. Repeat about three times. This has worked for me before.

 

"warped rotors" is a bit of a myth, you really gotta but your car through hell to warp rotors. Wrap rotors 9 times out of 10=pad deposits

Rebed your pads and see if it goes away

 

resurfacing or replacing your rotors would make it go away for sure. rebedding the pads might work (it didn't help for me)

i agree it is likely uneven pad deposits that is the cause.. this happened to me after my last track day, when i inspected the rotor, sure enough, i can see outlines of the brake pad imprinted on the rotor. your case is likely not as a severe, but i think it is the same root cause.

over the last 2 weeks i've tried to do a few hard stops with cold brake pads (while they are still abrasive) to try to scrub off the deposits, and then be easy on the brakes (so they don't heat up and become adhesive, so i don't add to the uneven deposits). it seems to have made things a bit better, but it hasn't gone away completely. i think i will end up having to resurface or replace my rotors

hope this helps!

 

most of the time it is warped rotors

my civic warped rotors like crazy back in highschool. the school was on top of a hill so everyday i'd have to ride them for about 3-4 miles. and every time i resurface them they worked like new.

back at my old work we would resurface tons and tons of customer cars with compliant of vibration of steering wheel while braking and 98% of the time it was fixed with a resurface.

 

I've never had to have my rotors turned (60k and counting) but I've seen some of my friends' needing to get done. Most of the time it looked like they were warped, when the machine started turning them. Though, with such a small sample size, maybe I just hit the few where it really was warped.